The King of Beasts: 40 Ferocious Lion Tattoos

Lions have incorrectly been referred to as King of the Jungle (most actually live in sub-Saharan Africa), but they could possibly be king of Instagram. With almost 200,000 images tagged #liontattoo, the only animals which come close to the popularity of lions are the tiger and the humble house cat. It seems people love their cats, no matter big or small!

You’ll generally find lion tattoos in black and grey, as the greywash tends to offer more contrast. Personally, I find it more visually appealing than if the lions were replicated in their sandy colour on skin. However, there’s still a wide variety of styles in the tattoos down below: geometric, abstract, watercolour.

I’d like to say that these forty are the best lion tattoos on the internet, but even a loser like me doesn’t have the time to look through all 200,000 images. It’s a hashtag that is impossible to keep up with. After scrolling through several hundred rows of images, I checked to see what date one image had been posted, and it was only 20 hours ago – that’s how frequent freshly inked lion tattoos are shared.

@edgarivanov

@eduvertikal

@sforza.art

@pone.reyes.tattoo

@klaudia_holda

Lemon Smiff

Matias Noble

Nadine Bryant

Saskia Chowles

Smel Wink

Ben Thomas

Harley Kirkwood

Jamie Mahood

James Strickland

Karl Marks

Kat Abdy

Jamie Mahood

Elizabeth Markov

Riccardo Bottino

Beau Parkman

Brian Zolotas

Sam Rulz

Teneile Napoli

David Simpson

Orbis Lopez

Lee Sheehan

@dotyink

Billy Raike

Brian Murphy

Lauren Jayne Gow

Smel Wink

Marc Durrant

Samantha Vail

Analisbet Luna Fegan

Miss Kimberley

Alexis Vaatete

@amylynn.colson

@bulletbg

@evanolintattoo

Choosing a lion for a tattoo is not a unique concept, although getting one from a talented artist will definitely make you stand out from the crowd. That’s my nice way of saying that 99% of them are shit!

And even shittier is a number of “artists” ripping off this geometric lion design from Klaudia Holda. Not only is it piss poor to steal another tattooer’s work, but to then tattoo it so poorly is really just another kick in the guts.